Help me figure out why my military is running

[General_Jah]

Hey guys,

I'm new to SR2010 and again have been daunted by the sheer learning curve of this game....

I'm currently playing Argentina and have got my economy going pretty well (or so it seems) mainly through selling a butload of consumer goods and industrial goods.

Anyway I have a much larger military then Chili which is next door so I cruise over a bunch of engineers/artillery/tanks to the border and try to invade.

#1
At this point is where this game really starts to frustrate me. I hear a bunch of battle noises and see some animations but honestly I have absolutely no clue what the heck is going on... I mean I can't tell if I'm winning or losing, what units are doing well for future reference etc. What am I missing here?

#2
After what seems like a very short while all my units start to retreat back towards bases or other areas of the map and I have absolutely no clue why. It appears they still have supplies etc but I'm not 100% sure b/c I'm new. One thing is for sure, Chilis AI units are not retreating back to any bases, they are sitting there wrecking shop.

If you guys could shed some light on this I would very much appreciate it.

Thanks!

[dust off]

Could be that your units have taken enough casualties to prompt a move back to base to repair.

What level have you set the AI to handle your own units. Many forum players, myself included, set this AI control to near zero because of its not so great decisions.

[General_Jah]

Could be that your units have taken enough casualties to prompt a move back to base to repair.

What level have you set the AI to handle your own units. Many forum players, myself included, set this AI control to near zero because of its not so great decisions.

Well I had set it at high in my first test, then I set it at low.

Should i remove it totally then?

The units I saw running back seemed to be in a very full state.

[dust off]

mmm? Sounds like it could be your AI general. Try sacking him and setting the unit intiative to zero. Just remember to keep a close eye on your units for when their strength is low or when they get enveloped.

[tkobo]

Hheheheh, yup to all of the above.

Just keep in mind, even with initiative at zero, units wounded badly enought will often still pull themselves off the frontline.

As for the complexity and learning curve, embrace it.Far too soon i think, you will have it down , and the game will seem too easy.
So enjoy the moments.

[Cirdan]

Could also be that they are out of supplies. Units have a tendency to fall back when they run out of stuff to shoot. You can set it up so that they'll remain on the frontlines, but using ATGM launchers as clubs doesn't work to well.

[Lightbringer]

As for determining which unit's are performing well. Try segregating them. With Engineers in one stack and tanks in the other etc. Especially if you can find two similar unit/stacks of units for each type to attack, you will have an easier time telling who rocks and who sucks. Once you have picked a few units you like, you can resume a combined arms unit grouping if you like.

[General_Jah]

As for determining which unit's are performing well. Try segregating them. With Engineers in one stack and tanks in the other etc. Especially if you can find two similar unit/stacks of units for each type to attack, you will have an easier time telling who rocks and who sucks. Once you have picked a few units you like, you can resume a combined arms unit grouping if you like.

good advice, though is there any advantage to unit stacks? Such as having AA guns in with your tanks to protect them from aircraft?

[Lightbringer]

I find it depends on several things. The size of your armed forces, availability of longer ranged AA, and the strength of the opposing air force for starters.

If you are in a position to have dozens of stacks of tanks and mech infantry, then adding units with different speeds can really add to the confusion and micromanagement of your forces. If your forces are smaller then this isn't such a factor.

If you have access to some of the long ranged AA units available, then keeping a separate stack of such units close behind your combat forces becomes a good option. Some of them are pretty tough, but mobile AA is fairly easy pickings in most heated combat situations.

If you are planning on invading the U.S. or a European country, dealing with their air forces are a major factor to plan for. I'm not sure what Chile would have in your scenario, but it may be enough to keep such forces close in reserve and move them up when/if it becomes a problem.

If you do decide to create combined arms stacks, one tactic you may want to experiment with is the escort order. It has major shortcomings in pitched battles, but for more simple troop movements and random small combats with one or two units, it works well to keep your groups together. (shortcoming #1 is... if the unit you have your stack escorting decides to retreat because of heavy damage, the rest will follow)

Also, you mentioned wanting some hints on interpreting the battle animations and being able to judge if you are winning or not. First set the game speed on slow when a larger battle begins so you can watch more easily. As you get used to it you will be able to speed things back up. Watch the explosion animations. Unless things are really chaotic, you will be able to tell which stacks they are over. These represent taking damage, and you will be able to see the strength bar(s) shrink as the unit(s) is damaged. As the battle progresses you can judge who will win based on who is firing more rapidly and who is hitting harder. Also the unit or stack doing the firing will have it's little circle of home color appear to indicate who is firing.

Anyway, to answer your question more simply (after much babbling and extra information), in smaller scenarios I often keep short range AA with my front line combat units. The attacking enemy air will either get chewed up while it attacks the main combat units, or attack the AA, giving the main units more time to complete their task. In all possible situations, I keep some sort of transport/supply unit either with the stacks or following very close behind. The added range this gives a stack can be a real difference maker .

The Europeans make a couple of amphibious supply vehicles that I find invaluable to my Mech infantry forces, the ASV-AX and the BMA-10. This is because I prefer speed, range, and amphibious mobility over offensive or defensive stats for the majority of my forces, with tanks or heavier mech infantry units following for the knockout blow.

...and yes I know other regions outside the USA and Europe have air forces worth worrying about.

[Il Duce]

Abstracting on Lightbringer's post a bit -
Depending on what's available in your region, it helps to understand the doctrine behind those units, and play them as they were intended to be used. For instance, small AA [like stingers] might well be interspersed in a stack of infantry [kind of like the chewy center of a tootsie pop], while a fully mechanized AA with some range might be kept a hex or two back - it helps to think of these units as being commanded at corps level, not battalion or brigade. Developing other kinds of mixed forces is a similar puzzle. Building and deploying based on a long-term vision of how and where your units will fight gets you to a mixed force - you can't just throw them together.

You may find at times that you are missing a critical type of unit to get the mix you want - trade for these. I typically spend the first 18 months of a game just getting designs. [Who would have expected Russian assault forces to have AC-130 support?]

When working with new unit types or new mixes, I will often spend a lot of time 'rehearsing' their movements to see what does and doesn't work. Using 'escort' orders can be useful, if used with discretion. For example, in a pseudo-division group of units [perhaps 7-10 stacks logically related with 3 or 4 different stack-mix models], I may have supply units ordered to escort AA and arty units [which are both slow and tend to be high consumers]. I may let other stacks travel without any particular coordination or escort orders [like a stak of mixed infantry and armor] - but then, through practice, I know what each stack should contain and how to reconstitute it.

I should qualify all of this by saying that I turn ALL initiatives OFF [including very close management on 'opportunity fire' settings in arty and air ROE's] so I do not have to worry too much about composition perfection - I'll know what is or isn't there when I set up an operation. Any kind of organizational effort like this would be immediately trashed by the AI and ops minister - there's no saying either way what they'll do if you serve them up a nicely balanced group of mixed forces stacks. The AI tends to just grab the nearest unit of the type it needs from anywhere handy at the moment without a great deal of respect for organization integrity. For instance, if it needs infantry it won't necesarily distinguish amphib from non-amphib, just takes whichever is closer, and will mix the two.

The point is that having an idea of what you want, and figuring out how to maintain it and work it is part of playing this game - so experiment until you find out what works for you. Don't worry too much if what you are dong does not match what others are doing - once you've played a few different regions [topography, technology and budget will make a big difference], you will see that there are many different solutions.

[Lightbringer]

I'll second the shopping around for units idea. The more money I can come up with, the more my forces look like a catalog of winners of a "best military equipment on Earth" contest. Lord help me, even the next time I play the U.S. I'll think long and hard about using French armored personnel carriers and Russian transport Helos, not to mention a dozen other unit designs.

Il Duce makes a good point, part of the fun is creating your own vision, I was merely using some of my own ideas as examples.

[Il Duce]

...An interesting mod would be to edit the unit file and scramble up the regional association codes. For instance, if you just reversed the U.S. and Russia, then Russia would have to figure out how to fund building the US doctrine, and the US would have to figure out how to staff the Russian units. Note that funding unit builds also includes providing I- and M-goods, something that is somewhat obscured in normal play. This kind of mod would be fairly simple [from what I understand - never have dinked around with this] and probably quite amusing. Might even make a nice lobby option, although I suppose it would get messy because of correponding dependencies on the tech tree.

[Eric Larsen]

even the next time I play the U.S. I'll think long and hard about using French armored personnel carriers and Russian transport Helos,

Lightbringer,
You should check out the heavy Russian transport chopper. Beats the pants off of the Chinook in transport capacity. There are some good international designs you shouldn't overlook.
Eric Larsen

[Lightbringer]

Yes sir, that was what I was saying. I'm hooked on the Mi-26 Halo, it was one of the first unit designs I purchased in my current game and I have been keeping my eyes open to check out the details of the yak-60 or Mi-52. Russia and China also have a superior rocket artillery selection. The French VBCI, and VAB-NG are as good as any U.S. American APCs at the same tech level and cost less to build more quickly. I also like the Eurofighter Typhoon series for interceptors and F/Bs. I could go on, but the idea is to shop around and find the best deal for your own military vision (and budget! ).